by Matt Lincoln
“He says that this morning, someone contacted him, claiming to be a part of the group that hired him to make the bomb,” Tanaka informed me. “They told him that two government agents from America were coming to arrest him for making the bomb. Then they told him that he needed to figure out a way to eliminate them, or they would kill him to keep him silent.” I wasn’t sure if I entirely believed that. It seemed like he was incredibly prepared for someone who had been caught off guard like that.
“So he just happened to have a gun and a police uniform lying around?” I asked. After Tanaka asked him the same thing in Japanese, Ueda began crying as he answered.
“He says the uniform belongs to his son,” Tanaka explained. “That’s the real reason that he was so willing to comply with their demands. He’s afraid they might hurt his family if he doesn’t.” That definitely threw a wrench in things. Even though I’d set out to drag this interrogation out for as long as possible, I realized now that I needed to end it quickly. Daichi was outside listening, and I needed to get to Ueda’s family before he did.
“Does he know anything else about the group?” I asked Tanaka. “The faster we catch them, the faster we can get his family to safety.” The man just shook his head sadly as Tanaka spoke.
“He says that he really doesn’t know anything,” Tanaka turned to me after the man had answered him. “But the computer he used to communicate with them is in his house, hidden behind a false wall in the back of his closet. We might be able to get something useful off of it.” Just as he finished speaking, my phone chimed. I pulled it out of my pocket and saw that I had a single text from Wallace:
NCB IS THERE NOW.
“I think that’s everything we’ll be needing then,” I nodded as I stood up. “Officer Tanaka, could you please escort him to a secure holding cell away from any other detainees? Make sure there’s a guard on him at all times.” We needed to be careful. The NCB was here to arrest Daichi, and with any luck, he’d be off our hands in just a few moments. Until then, I needed to make sure we kept Ueda away from him.
We made our way out of the interrogation room. I was about to come up with some excuse for Junior, Daichi, and I to go downstairs to the lobby while Tanaka took Ueda away. Before I could, though, a loud bang cut across the room, so intense that it left my ears ringing. For a second, I didn’t understand what had just happened until I processed that what I had heard was the sound of a gunshot at extremely close range. Ueda fell to the ground beside me, and I could see a pool of blood beginning to form around him.
In front of me, Daichi was staring down at Ueda with a look of contempt. His hand was still outstretched, and the smell of gunpowder was emanating from the gun he was holding. He turned to me with a snarl, and I was barely able to jump away in time to dodge the bullet as he fired at me. I rushed to pull my own gun out of its holster as Daichi turned and took off down the hallway with Junior hot on his heels. Tanaka was leaning over Ueda and checking for a pulse while yelling something into the radio attached to his shirt.
I jumped to my feet and chased after them. I heard gunshots as I pursued them, and I cursed silently. I hoped it was Junior firing and not Daichi. As I reached the end of the hallway, I heard a shout and a low thump coming from around the corner. I raced to catch up and found Junior on the floor, grappling with Daichi and struggling to wrest something from his hands. The wound in Junior’s side was bleeding through his shirt.
“He’s trying to call someone!” Junior shouted as he kicked Daichi. I moved forward to assist him, but before I could get to them, Daichi let go of the phone and rolled away from Junior. I saw him dive for something on the ground, and I realized he was trying to retrieve his gun. He must have dropped it during his fight with Junior. I brought my boot down hard on his hand just as he was about to grab it, and he cried out in pain.
I could hear shouts and footsteps as officers approached our location. I forced his hands behind his back before cuffing them into place. Once I was sure that he was immobilized, I looked up to check on Junior. He was sitting against the wall and had both of his hands pressed against his side.
“You okay?” I called, pushing my weight down on Daichi as he tried to get up.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” he answered weakly. His skin was sallow, and there was a thin sheen of sweat over his face.
“We’ll go to the hospital as soon as this jerk is in custody, okay?” I told him. He really didn’t look good. Just then, Tanaka rounded the corner with several other police officers. Unlike Tanaka, though, they weren’t wearing regular police uniforms and had dressed in office clothes instead. I realized they must have been the officers from the NCB.
One of them said something to Daichi in Japanese as two others hauled him off of the ground and held him between them. Once he was in their custody, I walked over to Junior to help him up off the ground.
“Hello, Agent Hills and Agent Chapman?” One of the officers asked. She had shiny black hair which was slicked back into a neat ponytail.
“That’s us,” I nodded with a bit of trepidation. “And you are?”
“Officer Izumi Hajime,” she introduced herself. “I’m with the NCB. Agent Nelson contacted us, and he told us that he believed the officer that was assisting you on your investigation might actually be a part of the organization you are after.” She looked over at Daichi, who was seething and struggling to break from the two NCB officers. “I’m extremely sorry about what’s happened here, and I want to assure you that we’ll be taking measures to be more cautious from here on out. From now on, you’ll be working directly with another member of the NCB or me. Since this is now a matter of police corruption, it is important to us that we root out any other officers who may be working with this group.”
“You’ll have to forgive me if I’m skeptical until I get a chance to talk this over with Nelson,” I grumbled, eyeing Officer Hajime with suspicion.
“Of course, I understand your hesitation,” Hajime nodded. “Please feel free to call him now. I’ll provide any documentation you require. In the meantime, we will be taking Mr. Fujioka into custody. Since police crimes are our jurisdiction, we will need to conduct our own investigation.”
“Wait,” I called as they started to drag Daichi away. “I walked up to him, so I could stare him straight in the eye. “Why did you kill Ueda? He could have sold you out by name, but he didn’t.”
Daichi's snarl disappeared, only to be replaced by a horrid, manic smile.
“He shouldn’t have said anything at all,” he snarled. “No one speaks against our group. You’ll never find us. Even if you take me down, you’ll never get all of us!”
The look in his eyes was deranged. The two officers proceeded to drag him out of the station a moment later, and I pulled my phone out of my pocket to call Nelson.
25
Junior
I’d accidentally made my wound worse. The doctor had scolded me once we’d finally made it to the hospital, saying that if I’d just come in sooner, the injury wouldn’t have been nearly as bad. As it was, I’d torn open the stitches that the paramedics had given me back at the train station. I’d apparently torn my own skin in the process, and now instead of a clean gunshot wound, the injury on my side was jagged and would probably leave a scar.
“Well, what was I supposed to do?” I asked petulantly. “Daichi was right on top of us the whole time. He probably would have found a way to kill us while we were at the hospital. And it wasn’t like I could just stand by while he ran off after killing someone.”
“I don’t disagree with you,” Charlie replied as we left the hospital.
The doctor had stitched me back up with strict instructions not to engage in strenuous activity for at least forty-eight hours. I’d nodded along as he spoke, but I knew there was no way I’d be able to comply with that order. I just hoped that I wouldn’t get an infection in the process.
I sank into a bench placed outside of the entrance to the hospital and took my phone out of my pocket to check
the time. It was nearly seven now. The last bullet train back to Shinjuku would leave at eleven, which meant we only had four hours to interrogate Daichi, retrieve Ueda’s laptop, and get back to the station. After hearing that Fiona had been attacked, I wasn’t willing to stay in Kyoto any longer than absolutely necessary. We needed to get back by tonight so she wouldn’t have to spend the night alone.
“Do you think there’s any point in interrogating Daichi?” Charlie asked as if he had read my mind.
“What do you mean?” I asked, snapping my head in his direction. “He’s our best lead so far. He’s directly working with the organization.”
“Yeah, that’s true,” Charlie agreed as he took a seat beside me. “And he was so loyal to them that he was willing to kill someone in the middle of a police station just for vaguely mentioning them. Ueda didn’t name any names or give us any specifics, even though he was clearly afraid of Daichi. And yet he still shot him, right in front of us, in a building full of cops. Somehow I feel like we aren’t going to get anything out of him, even if we try. Did you see that crazy look on his face when they were dragging him away?”
I sighed as I mulled over his words.
As much as I didn’t want to admit it, Charlie was probably right. Even if we did manage to break Daichi, it wouldn’t be easy. By the time we made any progress, the rest of the organization might realize that we were on to them and try to run or try to kill us again.
“So, what should we do then?” I asked.
“I say we go get the laptop and bring it back to Gardner ASAP,” Charlie suggested. “She’ll probably be able to pull more information out of it than we could get out of Daichi, and faster too.”
“Okay,” I nodded as I stood up. “Let’s go, then.” While I’d been getting patched up in the hospital, Charlie had confirmed that Hajime was who she said she was. According to Charlie, Nelson had sounded extremely apologetic for not having vetted Daichi better beforehand and had told us to be careful about who we divulged any information to from now on.
“Nelson seems sure that we can trust her,” Charlie shrugged. “I don’t know if I’m convinced, though. Not that I don’t believe Nelson, but look at how easily we were conned by Daichi.”
“That is a good point,” I frowned. “But I don’t think we have much choice. We won’t get very far without some kind of assistance from the Japanese authorities, and besides, she seemed genuine to me.”
There was no way we could be completely sure that we could trust her, but for the moment, she seemed like the safest bet. With that in mind, I called her using the number that Nelson had provided to us and asked her to meet us at the hospital so she could accompany us to Ueda’s home. She agreed to meet us right away, and twenty minutes later, Charlie and I were climbing into her car.
“He said he hid it in the back of his closet, I think,” Charlie called from the back seat on the drive over to Ueda’s house. “It’s hard to remember. Right after he told us about it, Wallace texted me to let me know the NCB had arrived, and then right after that was when all hell broke loose.”
“Well, hopefully, it will be there,” Hajime frowned. “You managed to stop Daichi from alerting the group, but it’s possible that they may have searched Ueda’s home as a precaution, anyway. If they really are so careful that they will kill anyone who even talks about them, it’s possible that they won’t take any risks.” I frowned at that. Since Ueda was dead and we didn’t have any other leads, we wouldn’t have anywhere else to go from here without the computer. I really hoped she was wrong.
Those hopes were dashed as we pulled up to the house to find the door ajar. Even from the car, I could see that the wood around the door handle had broken and splintered.
“Be careful,” Hajime warned as she put the car in park and pulled her gun out of its holster. “They might still be inside.”
The three of us got out of the car and made our way toward the front door of the house.
“I’ll do a quick search of the perimeter to see if there are any other exits,” Charlie declared before quickly taking off around the side of the house. He rounded the other side just a moment later, shaking his head as he walked back toward us. “There’s no back door. If someone is in there, they’ll have to come out through here.”
“Okay, let’s take a look inside, then,” I replied.
We moved inside cautiously, branching off in different directions as we did. I didn’t really like the idea of splitting up right now, but we’d cover more ground this way.
“I’ll check out the upstairs,” Charlie called before taking off up a narrow staircase. While he did that, Hajime and I worked on clearing the ground floor. We each covered one side of the first floor before meeting in the middle. Once we did, we moved upstairs to join Charlie.
“Everything is clear downstairs,” I called out as I made it up to the second floor. “Is it clear up here, Charlie?”
“Yeah, it’s clear,” Charlie called from a room at the end of the hall, and Hajime and I followed his voice. “We weren’t the only ones looking for the laptop, though.” The scene that greeted me as I entered the bedroom was complete chaos. Every piece of furniture in the room had been overturned or broken entirely. The mattress and pillows had been torn to shreds, and there were bits of cotton stuffing and papers strewn all over the room.
“What about the closet?” I asked, moving toward the sliding door on the far side of the room. The clothes had been tossed aside carelessly, and I pushed them away as I knelt down in front of the closet. I felt around the edges and corners of the wall, trying to find anything that I could push or pull out of place. Finally, I found a small portion of the wall that seemed less firm than the rest, as if the area behind it were hollow. I pressed my fingers against the crack where that portion of the wall met the side of the closet. I bit my lip as my fingers were crushed between the two areas, then pulled as hard as I could. The wall slid to the side just a few inches, but now the gap was wide enough for me to slip both my hands inside.
“There’s something here,” I informed them as I pulled the wall to the side with both hands. Once it stopped moving, I reached my arm inside. My fingers closed around a smooth metal, and I wriggled the laptop out as quickly as I could.
“How did he even get that closed?” Charlie asked as I handed him the laptop.
“No idea,” I grimaced as I massaged the two fingers I’d crushed with my other hand. “I don’t see any handles or anything, and I just about broke my hand trying to get it open.”
“Whatever’s in there, he clearly did not want anyone to see,” Hajime deduced. “Apparently, even before he became involved with the group you’re investigating, he made his living selling bombs and weapons on the black market. It makes sense that he wouldn’t want the proof of his misdeeds found.”
“Well, lucky for us, he did a good enough job hiding it that no one else found it before we did,” I remarked as I took the laptop back from Charlie to stow it in my own laptop bag. “We should start heading back to Shinjuku if we’re done here. The sooner we get the laptop to Fiona, the sooner she can find out what’s inside.” It had taken us a little over an hour to get to Ueda’s house and to find the laptop. If we left now, we’d make it back to Shinjuku before midnight. Hopefully, that would be early enough for Fiona to do some investigating.
Hajime chose to come back to Shinjuku with us that evening, as it was likely that her assistance would be required there as well. If that was where the group was based, then she wanted to dig deeper and ascertain just how many more cops were embroiled in this. The ride back to Shinjuku was quiet. There weren’t that many people on the bullet train this late, and none of the three of us felt like chatting. The views on the way back were stunning in a different way than they had been on our way to Kyoto. Now that night had fallen, I couldn’t see the landscapes anymore, but I could see the bright lights of every city we passed. As pretty as it was, I couldn’t bring myself to enjoy it. I felt depressed about basically everything
that had happened since we’d arrived in Japan. We’d been played by a corrupt police officer, Fiona had been attacked, someone had shot me, our primary suspect was killed right in front of us. Overall, this mission had been disastrous.
Once we were back in Shinjuku, we called Nelson to get the address for the new hotel. It was a safety precaution, in case our phones fell into the wrong hands again. The new hotel was actually in Akihabara, about a twenty-minute subway ride from Shinjuku, so we headed down to the closest subway entrance to catch the train. Fortunately, Hajime knew her way around, so we didn’t have to struggle with trying to figure out where to get off or which direction to go. The subway wasn’t as crowded as it had been that morning, which was a relief.
Still, the quiet was unnerving in its own way. After everything that had gone wrong today, I kept expecting something bad to happen. I was glad when we finally made it to Akihabara. The hotel was only a six-minute walk from the station, and I called Fiona to warn her when we were in the lobby. I didn’t want her to panic at suddenly having someone knocking on the door.
“My own hotel is just a few minutes from here,” Hajime told us in the lobby of the hotel. “If anything happens, call me immediately, no matter what time. Please let me know what your analyst finds on the computer. I’ll be back here tomorrow at nine to continue with the investigation.” After that, we said our goodbyes and parted ways. I was glad to be able to put an end to this day.
26
Fiona
